This debate is going to devolve into an endless argument over wide abstractions and assumptions about Superman which I don't have time for. But what I will say... Is how is the marketing for Nolan's batman relevant at all? I'm confused, are you trying to argue that it's not the humanity and motivations of the characters that makes the audience care about a movie?

First of all it WAS marketed as a BW story first. Watch the trailers. The whole point of the freaking series was to feature Wayne's rise to becoming Batman. In Rises, batman is missing for the entire middle of the movie and the series even ends with him choosing to just live his life as Bruce Wayne. The crowds knew what the movies were about, and that's why they went. They arrived to see batman movies unlike anything they had seen prior; the elaborate backstory and the gritty real world setting being the hooks. Special effects and ass kicking mean little if you're not invested in the characters. If they were everything, then Batman & Robin would have won a f-ing Oscar.